


Going Up In Flames

by SophiaCatherine



Category: DC's Legends of Tomorrow (TV), The Flash (TV 2014)
Genre: M/M, collection of drabbles, one rogue canary story (shown in chapter title)
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-05-06
Updated: 2019-03-13
Packaged: 2019-05-03 00:38:29
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 13
Words: 7,837
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14557083
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SophiaCatherine/pseuds/SophiaCatherine
Summary: The ongoing decades-long adventures of Mick Rory and Leonard Snart.Coldwave drabbles/ficlets, originally from tumblr, that are too short to get their own AO3 entry.





	1. Misunderstood

_Prompt from @jessicamiriamdrew on tumblr: Mick/Leonard, 'they don't understand us but it doesn't matter' (title, feeling, whatever)_

Len is seething with an icy rage when he gets back from the the juvenile detention centre’s Family Unit. 

Lewis had decided to pay him a visit, not looking particularly believable in his guise of an actual father. It became clear, twenty seconds into the visit, that he was there to make sure Len’s story was staying straight with his. 

“Your own fault you got caught, son,” Lewis had said, smirking all the while. “Made some bad life choices, didn’t you?”

Len squeezed his hands into the tightest fists he could make and stared at the guards.

“Bet those counsellors are trying to get you to talk about lots of things, huh?” Lewis said, eyeing the guards and staff around the unit.

Len gave Lewis what he wanted: silence.

When Mick gets back to their shared room, Len is sitting against one bare, grey wall, bouncing a rubber ball - lifted from the Family Unit - against the opposite bare, grey wall. Mick is practically shoved inside and the door is locked behind him.

“They read you the riot act?” Len asks, lingering over every word as he stares at the wall.

“I’m still here, ain’t I?” Mick snarls. Len gives him a look, eyebrows raised, and Mick visibly calms down a few notches. He drops onto his bed, watching Len across the room. “You good?” he asks.

Len shrugs. The ball hits the wall. It bounces. Lands back in his right hand. And back against the wall. Bounce. Left hand. Wall.

After a minute, Len asks, “They listen to your side of the story?” 

“Nope,” Mick says. “They believed the smug bastards who said I hit first. I gotta do bathroom duty for three weeks. Three fucking weeks.” He stretches out across his bed. “I hate this shit,” he says. He waves vaguely, indicating the whole of juvie.

“There are worse places,” Len says darkly.

Mick sits up against the wall. “You and me, Lenny - we got shit luck,” he declares, wide-eyed. “Or it’s just… No one gets us. I don’t know.”

Len smiles.

“What you laughing at, asshole?” Mick snaps.

“Luck. It’s nonsense. We make our own fate, Mick.”

Mick rolls his eyes. “Right. That’s how you ended up here.  _You_  made your own fate.” He looks pointedly at Len.

Len drops the ball. It bounces, once, twice, before rolling away under Mick’s bed. He pulls himself up against the wall and tilts his head. “It’s not forever,” he says, “Gonna end up somewhere better, one of these days. What about you, Mick?”

Mick glares silently at his hands for a minute. “Doubt it,” he eventually says.

Len laughs. “Don’t be like that,” he says, getting up and depositing himself on his own bed opposite Mick. He plays with nimble hands, tapping the side of the bed in patterns with his left hand. “The world may be a shit place, but all you have to do is figure out how to get what you want from it. For example,” he continues, lifting one finger of his right hand. Mick raises his eyes to the ceiling again, but Len just rolls on. “For a long time, I’ve been thinking about the way my father” - he grimaces at the word - "does business. He makes some very…  _unfortunate_  mistakes. I’ve been thinking about all the things I could do better.” He looks askance at Mick. “All the things  _we_  could do better.”

Mick grunts, but he’s clearly listening.

“And if no one gets us… Well,” Len continues, drumming his fingers harder against the bed, gazing out through the bars on the window. “Can’t fight what you don’t understand.”

“You done with your speechifying?” Mick asks. He’s starting to look bored.

Len laughs. “For now.”

The six o’clock dinner bell rings a second later, and Mick groans and puts his head in his hands. “Never a fucking minute to yourself,” he grumbles.

“Come on,” Len orders, jumping down off the bed. “Let’s see if I can steal you extra pudding.” As the guard unlocks the door, Len marches out with purpose, while Mick slumps out behind him.


	2. The Picture

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Len, Mick, and a picture.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Moved from [Waverider Wanderings](https://archiveofourown.org/works/12193440/chapters/27684840), where it didn't really fit. Hope you enjoy it even if you're seeing it for the second time!

‘TRUE FRIENDS STAB YOU IN THE FRONT’ yells the adage, scrawled across the picture of a bloody knife discarded in front of a blazing red campfire.

Mick whistles as he bangs a nail into the wall, just above his training bench. Then he gently hangs the picture on the wall, and takes a moment to enjoy it.

From the bed on the other, tidier side of the room, Len glances up from  _Pride and Prejudice_. He gives Mick a long look.

A really  _very_  long look.

Mick attempts to stare him him out, then gives up. He returns his attention to the picture. It’s a moment before he realises he’s still being stared at. He sighs.  _“What?”_

Len is buried in his book again. He just gestures. “Oscar Wilde was an antisemite,” he says, a barely-suppressed edge to his voice.

Mick takes a step back. He gives the awfully nice background picture a final nod. “Right then,” he says, and takes the picture down.

It’s on the top of his next burning pile.

(Len takes him out for barbecue afterwards. At a sports bar. He isn’t even moody about it.)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I later discovered this quote is only dubiously attributed to Wilde. But close enough.


	3. The Blanket

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Prompt from @robininthelabyrinth on tumblr: _coldwave, prompt: the one problem with stealing a wonderful weighted blanket is that neither of them are willing to leave it long enough to get food or answer the phone and now Lisa is annoyed at them_

“This is ridiculous,” she says from the doorway between rooms, where she’s standing with her hands on her hips. 

“Did you want something, sis?” he says, drawing out the vowels, as lazy as he feels. He’s lying on the sofa, partly covered by a thick, heavy, fluffy blanket. (It’s the best blanket he’s ever been under. Also, it’s got giraffes on it.)

She steps into the big space with the sofa at its centre. Her razor-thin golden heels click incongruously on the dusty warehouse floor, sunlight sparkling off her sequin-covered top under a leather jacket, as she glides in front of the sofa. His dangerous little sister, looking for all the world like she’s really about to kill someone. For a moment, he’s impressed. 

Until she gives him a look she’s been giving him since she was nine, and he collapses backwards onto the arm of the sofa, cackling.

She folds her arms. “Would you stop fucking  _giggling_ , please, Lenny? Are you drunk, or something?” 

He stops laughing and lifts his head to glare at the dubious accusation. “ _Please_ , Lisa. Just a bit -  _overstimulated_ , maybe. Job took till 6am. It was rather -” he yawns, “- tiring.”

She taps one of her heels on the floor. “And it’s now 5pm. Is there a reason why you don’t seem to have moved from the sofa since then? Have you even eaten today?” 

“Just napped, on and off,” he admits. He gestures at the blanket in explanation, lifting a corner to demonstrate its safe, reassuring weight. (Really very reassuring.) “Found this in the haul. Been meaning to get one of these for Mick.” He hefts the blanket back around himself where it’s slipped down.

She leans over to feel the weight of the blanket and gives him a sly smile. “For Mick, huh?”

“Yes,” he replies, scowling up at her. “For  _Mick_.”

Mick’s head suddenly pops up from under the blanket, on the other side of the sofa. “What?” he croaks.

Lisa shrieks.

Len starts cackling again. (Definitely not giggling. As if.)

Mick rubs sleep out of his eyes, then glowers at Lisa. “Someone wanna tell me what’s going on?”

Lisa shrugs, heading to the back of the room where the makeshift kitchen is set up. “I didn’t know you were there.”

“How? How did you not notice  _him_  under there?” Len says between gasps. 

Lisa continues, talking over Len. “Also, my ridiculous brother seems to have barely slept for, like, 48 hours. Could you take him to bed?”

“Lisa, I’m in my forties. I can get myself to bed,” Len protests.

She gestures behind herself in his direction as she makes coffee. “But are you going to?”

He draws the blanket tighter around himself, possessively. “I might,” he mutters.

Mick sighs. “Fine,” he says. He gets up and swipes the blanket off the sofa in one motion, dragging it behind him as he walks away. 

“HEY!” yells a suddenly-cold Len, feeling the loss of pressure in only his light PJs, though never more glad that he’s at least fully clothed. 

“Do you want me to carry you to bed, or are you coming on your own?” Mick demands, giving him a wide-eyed stare.

Leonard Snart doesn’t let anyone tell him what to do. 

But he’s going where that blanket goes.

Sighing, he gets up, taking a cushion with him to throw at Lisa as he passes her.

And then he slips into bed next to Mick, grabbing the blanket away from him and wrapping himself in it, top to toe, cocoon-like.

_His_  blanket.

(Sometime during the night, Mick snuggles under it with him. Len doesn’t protest.)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> One day while playing this game of 'how domestic can I make my coldwave' I am going to reach peak domestic and Len and Mick will walk out on me in protest


	4. The Plan

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Leonard Snart always has a plan. It's just that the plan doesn't always suit Mick Rory.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For ColdWave Week 2018, day 7: free day. 
> 
> [You can find the rest of my ColdWave Week fics here.](https://archiveofourown.org/series/1031178) There's also a [ColdWave Week 2018 collection](https://archiveofourown.org/collections/Coldwave_Events) full of everyone's wonderful fics for the event.

_Sunday, July 23rd, 6.53 PM_

Len tents his hands together and directs an icy stare through his fingers. He readies his coldest, most authoritative boss-voice, dripping with calm and control. He prepares himself to aim all the weapons in his arsenal at his colleague, his partner, his oldest friend, the man without whom he is nothing. The man who is currently standing between Len and his sole ambition.

Across the room, over by the sofa, Mick’s eyes are the size of saucers. His hands are in tight fists by his sides, his face is red, and he’s shaking with rage.

Len takes a long, deep breath. “ _Mick_ ,” he begins, through teeth clenched so hard his jaw hurts. “We have been talking about this for six months.  _Six months_ , Mick. Of planning, organising and logistics. We’ve discussed every aspect of timing and location. How is it that you’ve decided on an alternative plan  _just now?”_

Mick’s glare intensifies. “You.  _You’ve_ been planning this for six months. Never asked what I wanted, did ya?”

Len snorts, flinging his arms towards heaven in a  _why was I blessed with Mick Rory for a life partner_  shrug. “Oh, yes I did. I tried to consult you on details,  _especially_ alternative locations for your needs. You showed no interest, Mick. Just like you never do. You always leave the planning to me, Mick.” His tone switches to placating. “And that’s the way it works best!” Slowly, cautiously, he advances on Mick, arms still open in a peace-making gesture. “Buddy,” he pleads, trying very hard to inject some warmth into his voice. “This is how we do things, yeah? There’s still lots of options for you.”

Ever so slightly, Mick deflates. “Like what?” he mutters.

“Well. The bar, for example -”

“I said no bar!” Mick interrupts, eyes popping out of his head again.

Len counts out steady breaths. “Okay, okay. No bar. There are other ways you can still get what you want, though, yeah? And we can reevaluate things later in the week. But buddy… just pass me the remote, okay?”

“No.”

_“Mick…"_

Mick clutches the remote tighter in his fist. “I want to watch Top Chef.”

“Well,” Len grinds out, “you’re not watching it here.” 

Mick slams his beer down on the coffee table. “YOU’RE NOT THE BOSS OF ME!”

Len narrows his eyes. “I think you’ll find that’s exactly what I am.” He holds out his hand. “Remote, Mick.  _Now_.”

The remote joins the beer on the coffee table with another thump. Len keeps his wince imperceptible.

“Fine.” Mick grabs his coat. “You want me to go to the bar, jackass? I’m going to the fucking bar!”

Barely noticing the slamming door, Len has already grabbed the remote. He cradles his prize against his chest, while the opening narration of _Shark Week_ plays in the background.

It's maybe an hour later that, deep into a rerun of  _Megladon: The Monster Shark Lives_ , Len laughs and says "Did you ever see this one? Notorious shit. You'd love -"

He cuts off as he looks up into an empty little apartment.

* * *

9:01 PM: (2) Missed Calls from  _Lenny_

 _Lenny_ (9:03 PM): Come back

 _Lenny_  (9:04 PM): I put beer in the cooler.

 _Lenny_ (9:24 PM): Come on, buddy....?

 _Lenny_  (9:32 PM) Tomorrow I’m gonna steal you a TV for the bedroom.

 _Lenny_ (9:33 PM) ...How did I not think of that before?

 _Firebug_  (9:35 PM) cos ur not as gd at this planning shit as u think

 _Firebug_  (9:34 PM) 4K HDR

 _Firebug_  (9:35 PM) with netflix + nbc sports

 _Lenny_  (9:36 PM) Any kind you want.

 _Lenny_  (9:47 PM) It’s really good beer.

 _Firebug_  (9:48 PM) ok

The next day Len walks into a Best Buy and charms a saleswoman. He has security carrying the TV into his car before anyone notices he hasn’t paid for the thing. With Lisa behind the wheel, they’re miles away long before the downtown street hears the cry of sirens.

Mick gets to watch what he wants for the rest of week.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Prompt by @hiverforesteevee - Mick and Len watching TV.
> 
> Comments delight me. I always reply!
> 
> On tumblr [here](https://sophiainspace.tumblr.com/).


	5. Road Trip

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Len is stuck in hell. Or, at least, inside a car of a similar temperature.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Written for Coldwave weekend, Day 3: Fun in the Sun. [The Coldwave Events collection is here](https://archiveofourown.org/collections/Coldwave_Events).

Standing under the hood of the car under a burning Death Valley sun, Mick is whistling a jaunty tune.

Len is stuck in hell. Or, at least, inside a car of a similar temperature. “ _Of course,_ ” he mutters. “‘Let’s drive to Star City, Len. It’ll only take a couple of days, Len. I want to see the desert, Len.’ I am going to kill him with a spoon.” He scratches the damp, uncomfortable itch under his sweater. Then he bangs on the closed window. “Did you hear me? KILL YOU!”

Mick peers over the hood. He’s wearing khaki shorts and a t-shirt featuring a picture of Richard Blaise in a ‘kiss the cook’ apron. He waves.

Len winds down the window. By hand. Because the piece of crap they jacked for this trip is so old, it doesn’t even have electric windows. Or, right now, functioning air conditioning. This isn’t _ideal_ for a drive through the desert. “Oh yeah, and let’s get a ride that doesn’t work, while we’re at it.  _Fucker._ ” Wiping sweat from his forehead, he reaches down to grab his water bottle and attempts to take a drink. He turns the bottle upside down and shakes it. “Oh, perfect,” he growls.

“Okay, I think I fixed it,” Mick calls into the car. “Turn on the AC.”

Len obliges. Nothing happens.

“Hmm.” Mick scratches his head.

Len considers actually screaming. It’s not like anyone would hear, in the middle of Death fucking Valley.

Mick sticks his head in the window. Len jumps.

“Hi!” Mick says, grinning.

Len attempts to communicate Mick’s impending disemboweling-by-spoon with just his eyes.

“Okay, so it’s two problems,” Mick says, apparently ignoring the death stare.

“Great. Fix them and let’s get out of here.”

“So, about that.”

_“Mick…”_

Mick shrugs. “It’s fine. We just need refrigerant. Nearest garage is only twenty miles away.”

“Only…  _Fine._  Whatever. Get us out of here.”

Mick takes his damn time clattering back into the car, but eventually they’re off again.

“Terrible idea,” Len mutters to himself.

“Hey,” Mick says cheerfully, pointing at the car coming down the highway in the opposite direction. “Yellow car.”

Len purses his lips. “What?”

“Yellow car,” Mick explains patiently. “Car game. You see a yellow car, you say ‘yellow car’.”

Len aims a very pointed look at him, but gets no response. “ _Why_  do you say ‘yellow car’?”

“‘Cause it’s the game.” Mick nods along with the radio, which is turned up so high that a teenager would find it objectionable. Not Mick, though. “ _Show me heaven, cover me_ ,” he attempts to sing along. Emphasis on the ‘attempts’. 

Len lies back and practices his breathing techniques. He tries staring out of the window, but the endless charred wasteland doesn’t cheer him up much.

The relative silence is suddenly broken with “... _can’t take me anywhere, anywhere, anywhere_ …” Mick’s droning is about an octave below the singer’s less-than-stellar-anyway voice. “ _Doo doo doo doo_ —”

Len slams his hand against the power button of the radio. “Ahh,” he says approvingly, leaning back to enjoy the blissful silence.

Mick stops the car.

He turns a furious stare on Len. “What the  _hell_ is your problem?”

Len huffs and swivels to face the window, folding his arms.

“That’s  _it_!” Mick yells, getting out of the car.

Len blinks.

After a protracted silence, Mick calls out cheerfully to him through the open door.  “It’s 106 degrees out here. And every minute of hot air pouring into that car is another minute you ain’t got working AC.”

Still confused, Len decides his best bet is to go and figure out Mick’s problem.

Mick’s sitting on the hood of the car—Len doesn’t know how he isn’t sizzling right off it. He’s gone back to whistling, but is now somehow communicating ominous resentment with the same once-perky tune. Len rounds the front of the car cautiously, while trying to maintain an air of  _I’m the boss here_. “What?” he tries.

Mick raises his eyebrows at him. “You’re being a jackass.”

Len looks at Mick, then to his left, then to his right, and back again. “...And?”

“I’m sick of it. I been driving you across the country for 21 hours, you little shithead. Sitting here at your damn beck and call. ‘Radio off, Mick.’ ‘Seatbelt on, Mick.’ ‘Stop here, I want coffee, Mick.’ ‘You took that bend rather fast, Mick.’ And even ‘Why didn’t you warn me not to wear all these layers, Mick,’ LIKE I’M YOUR FUCKING BABYSITTER!”  

Len feels his eyebrows go up at what he considers a terrible impression. “Oh,” he says.

“Yeah, ‘oh!’” Mick says, now adding a right-to-left swagger movement to the impression.

Len suppresses a smile. He comes to lean against the car next to Mick, who has deflated and is retreating into a familiar sulk. “Ow,” he says, as the surface heat reaches him even through his thick jeans. He bumps Mick’s shoulder with his own. “I may,” he says, in the tone of one who does not like to admit he’s wrong, “have been a bit, shall we say, moody.”

Mick snorts, though he still doesn’t look at him.

Len folds his arms, glaring at Mick. “In my defence, though, you didn’t even check that the car was gonna get us through the desert.”

His partner shrugs. “Car seemed sturdy enough.”

Becoming aware that his arms are wrapped around himself, Len huffs. Then he takes a proper breath. “You are aware that I don’t like being shut up in a car at the best of times, yes?” he tries.

Nodding, Mick says, “But you said you were good with it. Why didn’t you say if you weren’t? Only four hours to Star City by plane.”

Len shrugs and kicks his feet in the dust. “You wanted to see Death Valley.”

Mick snorts louder at that. He lifts his hand, sweeping it across the barren landscape. “Well, there the shitty place is,” he says. “‘S got a good name.” He reaches into the car, grabs the map, and lays it out across the car hood—he slaps Len’s side, who scooches up to make room. “If we skip the national forest we'll be on Route 5 in a few hours. All the diners with all the iced coffee you want, going that way. And it won’t even get hot enough to kill you.”

Len considers arguing that Mick wanted to see the national forest too. Then he remembers that they’re outdoors in the 106 degree afternoon sun and he’s wearing a black sweater. “Sounds cool. Can we go now?”

“You won’t be an asshole?” 

Len pauses, since this sounds unlikely.

“I’ll call Lisa,” Mick threatens.

He chuckles, climbing back into the passenger seat. “Fine. I’ll try to be less of a—how did you put it this morning?—bitch of an asshole with a stick shoved so far up it that you don’t know how I’m still sitting in this seat?”

“Yeah,” Mick says, getting in. “A bit less of that.”

As they pull away, Mick reaches over to switch the radio back on. He skims through the channels, landing on one just in time for the irritating operatic opening of a Captain and Tenille song to come blaring through. He glances over at Len, who says nothing.

“ _If I should call you up, invest a dime_ ,” Mick drones, an octave below the already fairly appalling singer, “ _and you say you belong to me and ease my mind, imagine how the world could be so very fine_ …”

Len puts effort into not wincing. By the end of the song, though, he finds himself humming along entirely against his will.

Suddenly, Mick bellows out, “... _when you’re near me, baby the skies’ll be blue, for all my life,_ ” slapping the dash and grinning over at Len, who can’t help laughing.

As the song fades into something a little less appalling, they settle into a comfortable silence, and he relaxes into the hum of the engine.

“Yellow car,” Len observes idly, a few minutes later.

His partner grins.


	6. Ninja Movie (Sara Lance/Leonard Snart/Mick Rory)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sara and Mick are watching ninja movies. Leonard isn't.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Written for Coldwave Weekend, Day 4: Guest of Hono(u)r. Rogue Canary (Sara/Len/Mick).
> 
> A whole lot more Coldwave Events fics can be found [here](https://archiveofourown.org/collections/Coldwave_Events/works).

Mick lets out an admiring sigh. “God, she’s good.”

Sara has thrown herself lengthways across the couch, her legs slung across Mick’s. She’s introducing him to  _Ninja III: The Domination_ , which she was recently appalled to learn that he has never seen.

The Waverider’s rec room has been hastily set up for actual recreation, ever since Nate marched into Sara’s office and said that if she didn’t provide movie-viewing facilities, he’d be leaving the ship and going back to academia. Sara grumbled about the work she and Jax would have to put into setting it up, at the time—but she has to admit, it’s good to have a place to kick back, her crew being what they are. She grabs a handful of popcorn from the bowl in Mick’s lap—he grins a suggestive grin at her—and continues talking while she crunches it. “Right? The actual martial arts are pretty off-the-wall, but it’s fun.” She grimaces and waves at the screen. “Oh,  _come on_! What the hell is that?”

“Thought you cared more about fun than accuracy?” Mick taunts.

“Fuck that. That was no ninja move, asshole,” she gripes at the screen.

“‘Course it was,” Mick says. “Look, she’s got a throwing st— Oh yeah!” he yells, slapping his thighs. (Popcorn goes everywhere. Mick appears not to notice.) “Bloodbath.” He pokes Sara. “You were right. This is good.”

Sara grabs her can of beer from the coffee table in front of her. “It’s a spectacle,” she agrees.

Mick looks up, just now noticing Len on the other side of the room. “What’s the sulking for, boss?”

Glaring at his book, he doesn't reply.

Sara pokes her tongue out at him. “He’s just pissy because we chose ninja movies over sci-fi.”

“Kick!” Mick exclaims, pointing back at the screen.

Sara scoffs. “ _Terrible_ kick. That wouldn’t touch him. He definitely wouldn’t go down like that.”

She’s so engrossed in the appalling ninja moves that even she doesn’t notice Len slinking out of the room. She elbows Mick, and gets up. “Pause it,” she calls back.

She hears the beginning of a grumble about always being at some asshole’s beck and call, and makes a dismissive wave at him as she goes.

Out in the corridor, he’s a few paces ahead of her, grey sweater and black pants disappearing around a corner. “Hey, Snart,” she calls out.

He turns back. “Yes?” he says in a deceptively even voice, his face set hard as stone.

She slides into his space, putting a cautious hand on his arm. “What’s up?” she asks, her tone light, though her eyes are serious as they lock with his.

“Just not in the mood for the movie,” he says after a terse moment.

She rolls her eyes at the Captain Cold drawl. “You gonna tell me what’s actually wrong, or am I just going to play along and let you be a bitch?”

He snorts at that, attempting something like a smile as he slumps against the wall. Sara joins him, focusing her gaze on the grey floor and suppressing the snarky comments she’d love to make. She’s learning how to give him space, she realises, and a sudden jolt of—something—accompanies the realisation.

“We’ve been doing this for a while now—you, me and Mick,” he says suddenly, out of nowhere.

She tilts her head around to look at him. “Yes...?”

He’s idly running his prosthetic hand up and down the wall. It makes a little  _clang_  of metal on metal. As usual, she can’t read a thing on his face. “ _Casual_ ,” he says, at last.

She sighs. “Do you have any idea how to talk like a normal person, without all the, you know, vagueness and shit?”

“Don’t forget the puns,” he says, face still deathly serious.

She throws her head against the wall, rolling her eyes as far back as she can without hurting herself. “Leonard,” she sighs, and turns to look at him.

And suddenly his mask has slipped, and there’s an edge of fear in his eyes that’s so unfamiliar, it makes the assassin uneasy. “You really want to keep it casual?” he says, drawing the words out, and still looking anywhere but at her.

_Oh._

She reaches across the wall to take his prosthetic hand in her own hand. That makes him smile, suddenly unguarded, and she laughs under her breath. “I always want to keep it casual first.” She smirks. “If people stick around past that—well, anything’s possible.” She punches him on the arm, pulling back on the impact. “Some people are—well. You know.”

He cocks his head at her and chuckles. “Sure, and  _I’m_  the one who can’t talk about feelings.”

She laughs back. “Okay, so maybe the complete emotional unavailability of the three of us is the reason we’ve been doing  _casual_  for—what, a year now?”

He gives her a crooked smirk of his own, then slides back into silence.

“Uh-uh,” she says, pulling on the hand she’s still holding. “You do not get to run away and brood, jackass.”

“I’m  _contemplating_ ,” he protests, but he’s smiling at her with something like fondness.

“Sure you are. Wanna go back and watch terrible kung fu movies and not talk about our feelings some more, instead?”

“You want to put Mick back into the equation? Well, sure, that’ll be perfect for the avoiding of feelings,” he quips.

She grins at him. “One step at a time.”

Still, they walk back to the room hand in hand.

Sara returns to the sofa, sliding a little to the right and patting the seat next to her.

Mick raises a long-suffering eyebrow at his partner. “Lady wants you to join us, boss,” he says with what Sara could swear is a smug smile. If Mick doesn’t know everything his partner’s thinking at every moment, she’ll be surprised. She, on the other hand, is happy to keep the mystery going a while longer.

Len sighs, shoving himself between Mick and Sara with a “Hmph.”

Mick laughs and wraps an arm around him, while, on his other side, Sara lets her leg drift across Len’s.

“So, let me get this plot straight,” Len says, at which Sara and Mick both crack up. He ignores them. “An 80s aerobics instructor is possessed by the spirit of a ninja and goes on a murderous ninja rampage, yes? While continuing to teach aerobics on the side?”

Sara pats him on the shoulder. “Don’t think about it too hard,” she says. “It was the 80s.”

“Yes, Sara,” he says pointedly. “ _I_  remember them.”

She giggles and moves closer into his side. He very obviously suppresses a smile.

“Bingo!” Mick says.

Len scrunches his eyebrows at him. “Huh?”

“I got ninja bingo.” He pulls out an actual bingo card from where it’s fallen down the side of the sofa, and nods at the screen. “She disappeared into black smoke.”

“I can do that,” Sara comments lazily, now curled up very comfortably against Len.

Mick’s eyes widen. “You can’t.”

“Can,” she nods. "I'll show you sometime."

Mick blinks. Then he turns to Len. “Can we keep her?”

She feels Len freeze next to her, but only for a second. “I think,” he says, returning to his signature drawl, “that might be up to her.”

Sara just smiles.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks so much to [Thette](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Thette/pseuds/Thette) for beta-reading this.
> 
> Credit also goes to the excellent [areyouarealmonster](https://archiveofourown.org/users/areyouarealmonster/pseuds/areyouarealmonster) for inspiring the concept of a Leonard Snart with a prosthetic hand, who I now want to put in every slight-AU *ever*.


	7. London Bridge

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Rogues are in London, and Len's telling tall tales.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Written for [nirejseki](https://archiveofourown.org/users/nirejseki/pseuds/nirejseki)/robininthelabyrinth's [coldwave round robin](http://robininthelabyrinth.tumblr.com/post/176058704819/coldwave-round-robin-a-rogues-guide-to-the), 'A Rogues’ Guide to the World'.

“It’s a big dull bridge,” Mick says, as they stroll along the edge of the 1970s concrete monstrosity. To their left, the silver Thames courses magnificently through London, spanned by buildings old and new. On their right, less impressively, four lanes of loud traffic have just roared to a halt.

“Well, aren’t you observant,” Len says.

“Shut up, jackass. Ain’t exactly as  _jolie_  as Paris, is it?”

Len stops up short (Mick nearly walks into him). He drifts over to the edge of the bridge, casting a shrewd eye over the panorama. “I don’t know. View’s not bad.”

Mick concedes the point as he wanders over to stand next to him. The river twists away in front of them, and he points at the other bridge up ahead. “I guess that big one’s nice.”

“Tower Bridge? Oh yeah, that’s a stunner.” Len grins and swivels back to face him. “Did I tell you the story of the American who got scammed into buying London Bridge—the one that was here before this one?”

Mick folds his arms, anticipating a Snart story. He kind of likes them—not that he’d ever tell Len that. “Nope.”

Len props himself up against the bridge wall, ignoring the tuts of passing tourists and locals. “Heard the nursery rhyme  _London Bridge is Falling Down_?”

“Might have.”

“They say it’s the story of how the original London Bridge was a dilapidated wreck for about a century. At least, until an American decided he wanted to buy it.”

Mick raises an eyebrow, and points down to the bridge they’re standing on. “This gray piece of crap?”

“No, this is the replacement.” Len makes a grand gesture around them, walking in a circle as he does. “Picture it,” he says. “1960s. Right here, a much older bridge, and not aging well. That one was an ugly bridge, too, by all accounts. Some guy in Arizona hears London Bridge is literally falling down, and decides he’s gonna buy it and ship it over the pond to his river island. American style.”

Mick kicks the sidewalk—pavement, they call it here in stupid Europe—and says, “I believe it.”

“Except,” Len continues, “the guy apparently thought he was buying…” Raising mischievous eyebrows, he points to the beautiful bridge up ahead of them, with its castle-like turrets and grand suspension sections on either side. “... _Tower_  Bridge.”

Mick guffaws. “Seriously? The Brits scammed him?”

With a hint of a wry smile, Len says, “So I’m told.”

“Way to give the Americans a bad name, buddy.”

Pushing off from the wall, Len continues his stroll towards the south bank of the river, Mick trailing alongside him. “So. We getting our own back, or what?”

Mick grins. “What you got in mind, boss?”

Len points up ahead, where a colorful ship is permanently moored on the river bank. “Golden Hinde—the first English ship to circumnavigate the globe. It’s just a replica, but there’s some original stuff on board. They got actors playing pirates. What do you say we go talk them out of a few antiques?”

He feels a slow smile emerging across his face. “How ‘bout we wander in there in pirate costume and make like we belong there, then head backstage with whatever we can score? Y’know—for American honor.”

Len chuckles.

There’s an urban legend told on the south bank of the Thames, now. They say two pirates with terrible accents absconded with several thousand pounds’ worth of Elizabethan English treasure, yelling “Cheers for your antiques, mate!” as they scarpered.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's really hard to find a good picture of the concrete monstrosity that is London Bridge, since the internet keeps wanting me to show you [Tower Bridge](https://www.tripadvisor.co.uk/Attraction_Review-g186338-d187552-Reviews-Tower_Bridge-London_England.html) instead. Mick is right about which bridge is better.


	8. The Wheelchair

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Prompt from hiverforesteevee: coldwave + wheelchairs
> 
> _Concept: the first big fire Mick was caught in was when he was in his 20s…_

Len glared at the hospital-gray monstrosity on two sets of tiny wheels, a cage of sagging canvas and chipped plastic. It reminded him of a cheap horror movie prop.

“You are not,” he said, pointing, “going anywhere in that thing.”

Mick rolled his eyes into the back of his head, glaring up the ceiling. “Fucking hell, Lenny. I been lying here for  _six weeks_. Let me have the damn wheelchair!”  

The social worker looked between them. 

Len, who had never been a fan of social workers, folded his arms and stared her down, all black briefcase and severe hair bun of her. “We’re gonna need a better wheelchair, lady.”

“Don’t make no difference,” Mick protested. He smiled an apologetic smile at the social worker. It was a disturbingly pleasant smile for Mick.

“Mick.” Len attempted to turn an  _I’m the boss and I know best_  stare on his partner, laid out there on the sofa with bandages covering his immobile right leg. If Len couldn’t quite bring himself to death-glare at him, it was only because he was getting sick of his shit. “You are not sitting in that appalling iron cage. I’m not having it, understand?”

Mick gave the social worker a  _what can you do_  shrug, the movement slow and clearly painful where more burns disappeared across the back of his neck. “Don’t care what chair you put me in. I’m gonna be stuck here for two, three more months, yeah? Not planning on going far anyway.”

“Oh yes you are,” Len said, but there was no ice behind it, and Mick just shrugged again.

After he shoo’d the awful woman out—she wouldn’t take the chair away—he stood and eyed the piece of crap, hating it with surprising passion. “We can do better,” he declared eventually.

Mick snorted. “Gonna steal me a decent one, are ya?”

“Exactly.”

* * *

Mick heard Lenny clattering in from the car. He looked up towards the window just in time to see his freak of a partner, shit-eating grin all over his face, gleefully pushing something that Mick couldn’t quite see beneath the window. Hearing him dragging it up the three steps that led up to the little house, Mick snorted. Accessibility hadn’t been at the forefront of Len’s mind when he’d found them somewhere for Mick to recuperate. This was thoughtless of the ableist little shit, he decided.

“What the hell,” Mick asked as the wheelchair came into view, “is that?”

Len grinned wider.

The sleek midnight-blue chair looked more like something you’d take wheelchair racing than use to recover from an injury. Around the large wheels were silver spoke-covers, finished with huge bright orange and red flames.

Spinning the chair in the middle of the living room, his partner said, “Your fiery chariot, sir.”

Mick looked at it. “Huh,” he said, and nodded. “Not bad.”

Len gestured at it. “So. You coming for a ride?”

He felt himself grimace a bit. It wasn’t like he’d be able to push himself yet. “…I dunno,” he muttered. “Where we even going?”

“Everywhere,” Len smirked.

Chuckling, he let his partner help him up. Lenny was unhurried, careful, like he was handling a treasured score, and Mick hid a smile as he climbed into the chair.

“You tip me out, I’ll kill you.”

“Noted.”


	9. Cold's Cold

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Mick gets sick. Then Len does. Turnabout's fair play, after all - and it's only on brand for him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Written for sickfic prompt from callionielb on tumblr: "I'm dying." "You're not dying, you have a cold." "I SAID, I'M DYING!"

  1. **Mick: The Cold**



“I’m dying.”

“You’re not dying. You have a cold.” Len doesn’t bother looking up from his blueprints.

Mick coughs. It starts as ‘give me attention’ throat-clearing, and morphs into an actual coughing fit. When he can breathe enough to speak, he tries again. “I SAID, I’M DYING.”

He’s on the threadbare sofa, wrapped up in all the blankets he can find—which, in their almost-empty safe house, is not a lot.

From the table, Len’s head emerges from the blueprints. He leans over and lays his hand across Mick’s head.

“Fuck!” Mick shoves Len’s hand as far away as he can get it. “Your hands are freezing!”

“False advertising to claim otherwise,” Len says, laughing at his own joke a second later. “You, on the other hand, are running a little hot. Didn’t expect anything else.” And he turns back to his planning.

Mick groans. It’s only a little bit for effect, and mostly to express his real impending death.

Len ignores him.

“Lenny.”

Silence.

_“Lenny.”_

Len lifts his head again. This time it’s wearing a vexed expression. “What?”

“Can you make me tea? And don’t say, ‘Yes, Mick, I can, but that doesn’t mean I will,’” he says in a bad impression of Len’s drawl.

Len’s scowl twitches a bit. Mick might be imagining it, but he thinks his partner’s eyes narrow slightly with something like worry.

“Fine. Tea. Honey?”

“Three spoonfuls.”

Len gets up with a sigh, heading in the direction of the area they’ve set up as a kitchen. It’s sparse, but it has a two-ring stove and a tea kettle, and right now, that’s all Mick cares about.

A few minutes later, a mug of tea is set down next to him. “There,” Len says, and goes back to the table.

Mick drinks a few gulps. Then he lies back and tries to sleep.

 _Tries_ being the operative word. It’s like the Arctic in the safe house, the way Len likes it.

“Len,” Mick says, what he thinks is _hours and hours_ later, but it’s probably only really been ten minutes.

Silence.

“Lenny.”

Len gives the most irate sigh Mick has ever heard, but he’s got his attention. He gets a patented Captain Cold glare across the two-foot distance between them. _“Yes?”_

“Get me a hot water bottle?” He meets Len’s indignant stare with a grin. “What? You’re the one who said we wouldn’t be here long enough to worry about putting in central heating.”

He’s rewarded with a chuckle. “Fine.”

His eyes are closing when he hears Len’s voice again, not long later. “Here.” Len carefully lifts the edge of Mick’s blanket, and a hot water bottle slides snugly underneath. He frowns at Mick, apparently searching his face for something, then pats him on the shoulder and goes back to work.

Toasty and cozy, Mick drifts off to sleep.

When he wakes with a start again, it’s much later. Afternoon sun is filtering in through the edges of the mostly blacked-out windows. Len is nowhere to be seen. Mick attempts to get up, then the room spins and he thinks better of it.

“Hey, buddy. You’re awake,” he hears from the door, much later.

Mick drags himself into a sitting position and frowns. “The hell is that?”

Len grunts as he drops his bags and boxes of food on the makeshift kitchen counter. “I know they say ‘feed a cold and starve a fever,’ but I can’t figure out which one you’ve got. So let’s go for feeding you up, eh?”

He sounds as cheerful as he always does when he gets a really bad idea, and Mick narrows his eyes. “You’re gonna _cook_ for me?”

Len beams at him. “How bad can I be?”

The pizza they order two hours later is great.

“This ain’t snuggling,” Mick says defensively, when they’re curled around each other under the blanket. With their pizza slices. In front of Netflix.

“It might be,” Len says doubtfully.

Mick hums. “Strictly reserved for when one of us is sick.”

“Deal.”  


  1. **Len: The Revenge**



“I’m _fine_ ,” Len keeps insisting.

He’s bundled up in the parka like it’s a blanket, blowing his ruddy nose, and gripping the cold gun like an anchor. If Mick had to guess—and he’s normally right about these things—he’d say the room’s spinning away under Len’s feet. The guy stays stubbornly standing, of course.

Mick stands across the door, legs akimbo, arms folded tight over his chest. “You ain’t going.”

His partner has to stop glaring to sneeze. “We’be been planning dis heist for months.”

“And now you got a cold. One sneeze and museum security’s gonna go haywire. You wanna be in jail with a cold too?”

Len blows his nose again. “Captain Cold,” he says, attempting another glare as soon as he’s finished, “does not get colds. If he did, I’d be pud-ding about it.” He pauses mid-rant, tries again. “Pud-ding.”

Mick snorts. “You tryin’a say _punning?”_

“PUD-DING. Oh for fuck’s…” He descends into a sneezing fit again.

Mick has to stop to let out the fit of laughter before he can drag his partner to bed.

A couple of hours later, Mick is woken by sounds of fairly violent puking emerging from the bathroom.

“Mick,” says a small, defeated voice, a second later.

“Yeah?” he calls back. He’s much too snug under the blankets to move.

“I dink I’m dying.”

“Told ya. Come back here and sleep it off.”

There’s silence for a while, and Mick drifts back to sleep. He jolts awake again when there’s a worrying _thud_ from the bathroom. “Huh? W’happened?”

“I’m really dying,” Len croaks back.

Mick is out of bed like a blast from the heat gun. He slides in behind Lenny, who’s on his knees, wrapped around the toilet. His hand is cold and clammy—Mick finds himself gripping it in his own.

“Nghhhh,” Len says, when he’s finally done.

“Told you you shouldn’t have eaten so much Chinese takeout with that cold,” is Mick’s attempt at a helpful comment. He laughs, then cuts off when Len’s death-glare proves stronger than the forces of sickness.

“Yes. Thank you,” Len says, clearly wishing his flu on Mick. He turns around, his head lolling back against the bathroom wall.

Mick lays a hand across his forehead. “You’re freezing.”

“Think that’s the normal state of affairs,” Len mutters.

“Nah, that’s flu. C’mon, let’s get you to bed. Maybe to a doc in the morning?”

“Literally over my dead body,” he grinds out as Mick half-carries him back to the bedroom.

Mick chuckles. “Kay, maybe not. Hey, think that nice lady at STAR Labs does house calls?”

“I _hope_ you’re trying to make me laugh.”

“Did it work?”

Len raises his eyebrows over the edge of a smile, as Mick lowers him down onto the bed. “No, but good distraction.”

Mick tucks him in. “Let me just get you some tea.” He tries to pull away.

The grip on his arm gets tighter. “No.”

“Water?”

“No.”

“Hot water bottle, then.”

_“Mick…”_

Mick sighs. “What the fuck do you want, then?”

The expression on Len’s face tugs at heart-strings Mick didn’t know he had. “You,” he says in the smallest voice Mick has ever heard from him.

Mick chuckles and slides in under the covers next to him. “God, I’m gonna regret getting anywhere near you when I’m sick tomorrow, ain’t I?”

Len curls up against him. “No more than I’m gonna regret snuggling.”

He snickers. “Go to sleep, you pointless jackass.”

But Len’s already out and snoring.

Rolling his eyes, Mick reaches for his earplugs.

Then he glances at his partner—who might need him if he gets sicker in the night—and replaces them, quietly, on the bedside table.

He doesn’t get a lot of sleep that night, between the snoring, and Len getting hot in the night and throwing off the covers, flailing around and hitting him a few times.

Mick doesn’t mind really, though.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks to [kleptoandpyro](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Le_Me/pseuds/kleptoandpyro) for reading this over for me!
> 
> Come find me on [tumblr](https://sophiainspace.tumblr.com/) and [twitter](https://twitter.com/SophiaCatherin5).


	10. And Since We’ve No Place To Go

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _When Mick gets back to the cabin, Len’s watching that crap with the demon hunters._
> 
> A very silly triple drabble (300 words).

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For Coldwave Winter Week 2018. Prompt: Supernatural. ‘Extra’: Winter Cabin.
> 
> The shows they’re watching are _Supernatural_ and _Buffy the Vampire Slayer_. It’s probably fine if you don’t know anything about them. Neither does Mick.

When Mick gets back to the cabin, Len’s watching that crap with the demon hunters. Mick shakes snow off his boots and glowers at the TV.

Len waves a beer at him.

Mick grins. “Bribery?”

“Yup.”

“Fine, but you’re gonna have to explain this shit to me.”

He does. It’s ridiculous.

“Haven’t you been watching this thing for fifteen years now?”

“Twelve.”

“Sure, that’s better.”

Len shoots him a very Snart glare. “I explained. Now _shut up.”_

He makes it through another five minutes. “Does this main guy ever _do_ anything?”

“Other than be gruff and edgy? Not really.”

“Oh. They’re queer,” Mick says approvingly, after struggling through a bit more.

“Uh. Sadly, not officially.”

“...Huh.”

Later, “I like this Bobby guy,” gets a seasonally frosty silence.

Mick survives fifteen more minutes before he’s itching to say, “I’m bored,” into Len’s ear. “Make it more exciting.”

Len snorts and runs a hand down Mick’s thigh. “That can be arranged.”

There’s some very pleasant making out for a while, even if Len keeps leaning away to stare at the TV.

“Hey! I’m over here.”

“Shh. The Trickster’s about to run into the goddess Kali. I ship them.”

“You what?”

“Trust me. The sex’ll be hotter.”

Mick sighs, and fucking _waits_ while Len appreciates fictional characters.

Credits roll. Mick concludes, “Not enough vampires.”

Len shoves a DVD at him. “That’s next.”

Mick peers at the cover. An attractive young woman is clutching an obvious phallic symbol.

“ _Buffy_ _the_ _Vampire_ _Slayer_. Huh.  She’s hot.”

“And too young for you. You might enjoy Anthony Stewart Head.”

Mick manages to stay quiet through a bit more of this one.

“Xander’s worse than Haircut.”

“Mick.”

“I like Spike. He can stay.”

_“Mick...”_

“That’s the worst CGI I’ve ever seen. What the hell is it—a snake?”

_“MICK!”_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks to Ballycastle_Bat for beta reading, and to Thette for the Xander line. :D
> 
> Come find me on [tumblr](https://sophiainspace.tumblr.com/), pillowfort or [twitter](https://twitter.com/SophiaCatherin5).


	11. Duck Heist

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt from Hiver_Frost_Elf: coldwave + "When it was all said and done, their most recent—ahem—venture was highly profitable... if one measured profit in ducklings."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Tiny ficlet written for a ‘5 Sentence Fic’ meme on tumblr - ‘send the first sentence and I’ll write the next five.’

And now there were ducks - everywhere.

“Stop bellyaching, Snart,” Mick said, pushing two ducklings off the sofa so he could sit down with his beer. “Plan’s only half way through still, and I haven’t even _nearly_ got to the ‘sell them to the farm owned by the Santinis’ stage yet.”

Len put his head in his hands, cursing the day, three weeks ago, when he magnanimously said, _Mick, you’ve been looking for an opportunity to run your own con - take this one._ Meanwhile, a duckling was taking its own opportunity to climb Len’s head and shit in his hair.


	12. Hospital

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt from kleptoandpyro: Coldwave + "Open wide, Boss. Good. Now take it all."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Written for a 5 sentence meme on tumblr - ‘Give me the first sentence and I’ll write the next five.’ Turned out to be a bit of a sickfic!

Len attempts a glare that will thoroughly communicate just how much he _hates_  Mick right now. But he does as he’s told, opening his mouth so that Mick can pour the barium solution down his throat.

“He’s a baby,” Mick says apologetically to the nurse, who’s looking askance at them, after Len’s _I’m_ _not_ _drinking_ _that_  temper-tantrum. “And now we’ll just get the nursey to scan your tummy-wummy and they’ll know why it’s been giving you the shits and then they’ll make it all better, okay?”

Len tries to stop drinking the pint of solution to let loose a string of curses at Mick, but the nurse puts the straw back in his mouth, so he can’t.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Klep challenged me to make this completely innocent. I told them they were a terrible person, then did just that.


	13. No Puns

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Purpleyin’s prompt: Coldwave "No puns, for a week."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Written for a 5-sentence fic meme on tumblr - ‘You send the first sentence and I’ll write the next five.’

Len starts spluttering immediately, much to Mick’s amusement.

“Nuh-uh - you said to name the one thing you could do to make up for being an _almighty_ _asshole_ for the past week, and I named it.”

Len continues to froth like a coffee pot about how _I_ _hardly_ _think_ _that_ _punishment_ _fits_ _the_ _crime_ , _Mick_ , while Mick grins, ignores him, and focuses on his football game.

The boss lasts twenty minutes, before he makes one without thinking - something Mick asks about Harson’s game-play that has Len saying _pass_ , chuckling to himself, and then groaning with his head in his hands. Mick lets him have one freebie, since now he knows how it feels.

**Author's Note:**

> Comments very welcome. I always reply!
> 
> On tumblr [here](https://sophiainspace.tumblr.com/).


End file.
